I am wondering about this too. I am in Northern Idaho and on a typical winter it is very much freezing right now. Of course such is not the case, and I am wondering about my winter sowing adventure. It does freeze at night...sometimes. But I am only growing veggies this time around. Should I wait longer to set them up? Or is it ok to set up the containers and put them out?

Yes, put them in shade. Our winter temps are usually like what you are experiencing now. It does get cold here but only for short bursts at a time and snow, if we get it lasts about a day. Right now its in the 70s... but cold is on the way.

We have to keep our containers in the shade here until they sprout and then be very careful with them once we do expose them to sun.

I have been concerned about this as well. I have about 60 containers outside right now and its been in the 50s and 60s the last four or five days and forcasted to stay into the high 40s through next week. Do I need to be concerned about sprouting?

Thanks Melvalena,

I moved them today, they will get about 2 hours of early morning sun, but that is much better than the place they were previously. Tomorrow it is going to be very warm here, so I might just go ahead and move them under the deck (where it stays relatively cool, with no sun on top of gravel) Hoping for snow and colder weather, but until then praying they don't rot or sprout yet!

brow, I don't know what zone you are in there, but most vegetables won't germinate until it's predictably warmer (including at night), it won't hurt to wait a few weeks if you are in an odd weather pattern.

You said it's freezing at night, how about your daytime temps....Freezing at night with days as high as low 50's isn't going to encourage much of anything to germinate....that would make you averaging about 40 and cold enough for winter sowing of perennials, trees, shrubs.

I'm usually seeing forecasts for Boise at least on NWCN but have not been watching for the last few weeks. Often makes me envious, Boise seems to have exceptionally nice weather compared to my coastal gray.

Morz. I was thinking about bringing mine back into the basement; because they are in full all day sun. I'm not worried about the Delphinuims or Columbines; however, I am concerned about coreopsis and rudbeckia they are early sprouters.